Update Miriam

Update Miriam

"Today is my last day on treatment. I've been on meds and drips since monday. I guess it was really a bit severe. Tuesday & wednesday we were not so sure how this would work out and I guess I wasn't the only one wondering if I make it to heaven or not... I'm still sleeping most of the day and my mescles are very sore and I feel dizzy/drugged, but I started eating again. So, I'll be fine in some days."

Medical update

Blood continues to be removed from my veins as the USA doctors here try to piece together why my body failed in Feb... no great revelations as of yet... just the typical ruleouts. This week the docs are going down the immune mediated rabbit trail.... Last week my neck went inside an MRI tube to peek at my spinal cord which seems to getting pinched around C7 and causing increasing numbing in my left arm. We'll keep you updated. Having some much needed guided retreat time as we wait, in which we have committed to being in until 1 June...pray for clarity, wisdom, unity and communication. love in the Lord, Jean

Jean

- the following is a little heavy on the medical (in so far as I was able), since a good number of you all would want to know (forewarned is forearmed)
...
- got to the clinic this morning and Jean was looking a lot better, she could actually walk to the toilet and pass urine (the ultimate test in this case) on her own - she said the doctor told her, with her symptoms, she
should have died - well, that's my girl, never do anything by halves

- so here's the story - a couple of weeks ago, we had several vet students come for a 2 week training - about the same time, Jean had an unusual infection (which as far as I know, she didn't tell me about - ha) - it
seemed to pass but Monday, a week ago, she realized she had a temperature (showing a local woman how to use the thermometer; used on herself; whoa!)

- as per her usual, she plowed on through the week with the training - she later confessed she was a little woozy toward the end of Thursday afternoon - the students returned home Friday morning and Jean basically cratered                                                                              

- she stayed pretty low to the ground for several days - Friday, while I was returning from dropping the students on their various conveyances, Miriam (team member from Germany) took her to the local clinic to test for malaria, brucellosis and typhoid (all negative) - the main problem was she ate and drank very little and was having cyclic episodes of increasing pain, fever, and less-than-Jean types of "personal interactions" (extending up to our drive to Kampala)

- the clinic suggested ciprofloxin, flagel and doxycyclene (big guns firing in every direction; oh, and also, please repress any urge you may have to correct my spelling on these; I'm working on pronunciation at the moment) and lots of ibuprophen and paracetemol - these we did but without any sort of general trend 'upward' - Miriam got her on a saline drip and we brought her down to Jinja on Monday to see a doctor there

- the doctor saw her informally and listened to the story, Jean was weak but lucid and quite "herself" - the doc thought "tick bite fever" was a strong possibility (so, continue the doxy) and we took Jean to Calvary where she had another bad night - that evening, a local missionary nurse (20+ year veteran of East Africa, has a Masters, don't know the proper designation) tested her for malaria again and it was positive - given Jean's heart condition, she can only take certain malaria meds (pure artemecin products vs. the various combination drugs, or malarone; not quinine or heavy doses of larium, etc) - so, continuing the other antibiotics, we added malarone - our nurse noticed that Jean would blank out every so often for 10-20-30
seconds, then blink back in and connect with us again

- Tuesday morning, she wasn't really better so, Miriam put her on a dextrose drip, we talked to the nurse and doc again and decided to take her to "The Surgery" in Kampala (of the locally famous Dr. Stockley) - we put her on a mattress in the back of the truck and Miriam rode with her, managing the drip (and adding a saline bag on the way) - the nursing staff put her on a drip (continuing to today) - again, Jean was (very) weak but lucid - they did a blood test of a much more exhaustive kind (whose name escapes me): not anemic, practically no parasite count, low platelets - in the afternoon, Jean had another of her 'episodes' (thankfully; they are painful, and not only for her, but had not yet happened in front of an actual medical professional; so we appreciated her 'showing off' on this occasion); they catheterized her and continued pushing fluids through the night and doxy; opting for artemecin instead of malarone

- Wednesday (today), we were told she had vomiting and headaches in the night, the drip was continuous (catheter remains so far) and she's still not taking food or fluids in any real amounts - they ran more blood tests which all came back "normal" or "expected" - so they removed the catheter and cut
her loose

- she's back in Jinja now, resting, she's able to take some things orally and we can always put her on another drip if we have to - problem is, with all the heavy duty antibiotics (sans actual testing) early in the story, any
real diagnosis became pretty much impossible - we know that some form of malaria is/was part of the problem at least, even though not the initial issue - so she's on doxy for a month and artemethra (artemecin) for a week - badda bing-badda boom - we'll put this one in the "ambushes involving gunfire-Ebola (or was that Marburg)-legionnaires-cerebral malaria (and other CDC Biohazard Level IV occasions)" file - you know, hadn't had any of those for seven years of marriage, was beginning to think I was having a positive
effect on her ... oh, well - God is good/All the time/God is good

- thanks for all your prayers - several of you were instrumental in getting the word out (without naming any names, like, Michelle) - Many Thanks - please feel free to forward this to interested parties (and family
members) - I confess I don't have all the email addresses I should or would like to have -

Tom

Falling apart...

Jean here, somehow here as they say here in Uganda. Last you heard from me I was asking for prayers for an ear ache. Praise God, most have my hearing has come back. But now I'm looking like a pirate- a patch over my eye and an ankle wrapped in a splint. Long story. But the short story is- I'm continuing to age and play dangerously- so keep praying as we go to Mbale for x-rays

Here and there

So KKAB, the team of 4, is scouting out Kaabong district this week. Tom, Ryan and Miriam arrived today –stopping en route to Matany Hospital to diagnose Miriam with brucellosis, or Malta fever – ouch. Pray for her as she endures treatment for the next 6 weeks, and praise God that she didn’t have meningitis. I’m still down country nursing tennis elbow, probably from digging our 1meter deep trenches for our foundation last September. I remained in Kampala over my birthday to see a Danish physiotherapist – immediately after the Italian orthopod recommended surgery!

I’ll fly up to Kaabong on MAF on Wednesday and we will continue to search out where we will settle in after our learning phase in South Karamoja. Kasile, Karenga are subcounties that we are feeling called to. Pray for KKAB unity as we continue to grow and stretch as a team. It seems that God’s slowing us down, seemingly frustrating us with building and language to allow time and opportunities to continually shape and mould us together to be one as He is one.

hospital visit

Mary has been helping us with fetching water for about 5 months now. She lives a few doors away with her 2 children; the oldest, 7yr old Lokul Grace, has epilepsy. Two days ago during a seizure she fell into Mary’s cooking fire scorching the inside of her right thigh. When I reached our local hospital yesterday morning, a few people greeted me and asked about nurse Michelle, a future teammate that spent a week working in the wards with them, then I went to pray with Grace. She was sleeping as I looked at the angry, oozing 3rd degree burn, the size of a dinner plate, the center dotted with rabbit fur remnants – a local medicine used for burns. The hospital had no other treatment applied, just some meds for pain and epilepsy with a light antibiotic. After praying for comfort, healing and wisdom for the doctors I went home to see what supplies. A team from Our Father’s House (Chili, Wi) had just brought some non-adhering bandages and catheters that I grabbed together with the last of my ‘burn crème’ from a Dutch friend. I returned to the hospital after the staff had wheeled her into the theatre – I was anxious when I found her bed empty, but other patients guided me to find Grace’s worried mother just emerging from the prep area where she held Grace’s hand as she went under injectable anaesthesia. She urged me to go inside and talk to the doctors, and it’s a good thing I did. They were excited about the new supplies and had never seen many of the donated items and had me demonstrate how to use them. Mary just came over to update me this morning around 7am – Grace is doing well and wants to go home! We’ll do another bandage change tomorrow and meanwhile the hospital is trying different seizure meds to help control it better. Pray for wisdom. Pray also for Sofia, another patient that I’ve been visiting that seems to currently be starving herself. She has HIV/AIDS – a growing problem that was virtually non-existent in Karamoja a few years ago.
Thank goodness there’s a cow vet around to train local medical staff, thank God that these supplies arrived just in time to help Grace